Tom McCall

         I may have a new hero.

For the last three weeks, I have been working my way through Fire at Heaven’s Gate,  a biography of Tom McCall, Oregon governor from 1967-1975. I am not done, but it is a compelling read.  Living in Oregon I  see his legacy every day. It’s not a “cradle to the grave” biography, with no narrative peaks—it focused on his political life and there’s lots of drama. It may be fair to say the subject drew drama to himself, but it was also the era. As I read through his list of accomplishments, I find myself muttering “this man was a republican” over and over and wondering how we have shifted so far away from these values.

 While in office (and I am not done) the man supported:

·         Protecting Oregon beaches and public access

·         Cleaning up the Willamette river by regulating pulp mills

·         Keeping poison gas from being stored in the state (and transported by rail through the state)

·         The Bottle Bill

·         DEQ

·         Air and Water pollution restrictions on industry, even if it meant that the industry might locate in another state.

·         A Land Use process that put citizen involvement as Goal One and focused on protecting farmland from suburban sprawl.

·         Publicly speaking about his son’s struggles with drug addiction.

On Earth Day, he said “It’s obvious that a change in attitude is vital, and the first desirable change would be the realization that the problem of environment and pollution is not the other fellow’s, but the responsibility of everyone.”

 

 

Winter is coming

     It is raining. The house smells like cookies and granola, oat bread and yeast bread, as I work my way through food prep for the week. Solas plays on in the living room, drowning out the sounds of the rain. Outside, the cat is sleeping in the greenhouse—a golden ball of fur on the plant shelf, beside the geranium I moved in a few days ago. The rabbit is in his hutch with an apple; the chickens in the coop resting on a garden bed. Leaves cover the ground. Mark hung the storm windows last night while I made dinner and we sat by the first fire inside of the season. We are moving, a little reluctantly, into winter this year.

 

While I worked, I tried to focus on the task at hand—measuring oatmeal and baking powder, doubling a recipe in my head. But the news fills my mind….and it is not good. I read, last week, a section of Alexi Navalny’s diary from prison that was in the New Yorker. He came back to his country, knowing he would be arrested and probably die and he said, “I have my country and my convictions. If your convictions mean something, you must be prepared to stand up for them and make sacrifices if necessary.” (p 45, 10/21/24) And that idea melded with the end of The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien.  He did not step up to protect a friend from a bully and regretted the action for ever. Later, he observed:

For me, though, it did matter. It still does. I should've stepped in; fourth grade is no excuse. Besides, it doesn't get easier with time, and twelve years later, when Vietnam presented much harder choices, some practice at being brave might've helped a little. (P. 150)

We will be facing some difficult times ahead no matter who wins this election.  Climate change is with us. Challenges to our rule of law, our democracy will continue.  Are we practicing standing up for our convictions, now, when things are little less fraught? How we will behave in the coming years, if we are not?

The Catcher nd Being Caught

 

                I have been thinking, this week, about the way we, in community, catch people and are caught ourselves.

                A few years ago, a friend was climbing into a tree house, stepped on a rotten board and fell a long way. She was in the hospital for weeks and then home, immobile, for several months. When she was up and around again, she said that she felt like she fell out of a tree and right into the arms of her community, as everyone gathered around to help her heal. That image of arms reaching out to catch her—to catch all of us—has stuck with me.

                I have felt the same arms (literally, in some cases) reaching out to catch me in the past year. As soon as the Fiasco hit the news, people reached out. First, the city councilor whom I replaced—a deep voice on the line “What the hell’s going on? Do not give in and leave” followed by a flood of emails, phone calls, conversations…Where ever I went, someone was showing support, reaching out, asking questions, saying thank you. And it continues today. I have felt firm, supportive hand in the middle of my back for a year. I was caught.

                And so, I was talking with another friend about this—that, when we really need help, our community catches us. It was her first time, at 73, experiencing being caught; she has always been the one doing the catching. Showing up, moving chairs, asking how she can help and move things forward. Raising children. Taking care of a spouse. Saving the planet. Always catching, not being caught.  It was a little weird and uncomfortable to be on the other side, to be the one needing help. Maybe, we thought, we need to trade roles more often, to allow ourselves to be caught and supported in smaller crises as we move through life, so that we know, when a big one comes along, that we are not alone.

               

Fall Chores

 

               The seasons are shifting. We wake up before dawn these mornings; put the rabbit in by seven.  I wore my newly handknit wool socks this morning while reading the paper. Last week, we watched the golden  Harvest moon rise while the sun set over Mary’s Peak. The chores are also changing; along with the weekly housecleaning, we are snugging in for the long, damp winter.

                Last Saturday, we took on the wood pile. Almost exactly a year before, we had the two fruit trees—a cherry and a yellow plum— down. It was time. They had been planted when our house was built. One was growing Chicken of the Woods mushrooms, the other losing branches. I was worried about the power lines across the back yard in an ice storm (which happened this past winter). The arborist left us a pile of cut but not split logs which dried down all summer. We rented a wood splitter, asked a friend with a hitch to pull it over and back, and went to work. It was satisfying. By the end of the day, we had a huge pile of split wood, which I have spent the last week, between meetings and dinner, moving into the basement or into neatly stacked piles, as well as putting some of the truly funky pieces around the garden as habitat. Mark is sweeping the basement as the final touch to the project.

                While we were splitting wood, I was also processing tomatoes—cut them up and cook them down in the crockpot without a lid for hours to make a chunky sauce. Thirty five pints of sauce are now sitting on the basement shelves, along with 10 half pints of roasted tomatoes. I will harvest the basil and make pesto, then move the shorn plants into the greenhouse to see if they will sprout more leaves.  We dried figs and apples and plums earlier. This week, we will clean out the larder to hold the delicata and kobocha squashes I harvested when it was not my turn on the splitter. We will buy 70 pounds of onions and tuck them in there, along with seed potatoes and the fruitcakes in late November.

                This weekend, we are finishing up summer outside  the house work. Mark is sealing the dining room doors once more. I checked the caulking around the south side windows—and then went into the bathroom to hit the window there while I had the caulk out.  Mark has sifted out all of the compost bins and turned them all; I will spread the compost he has created in the beds that need the most love. Slowly, the summer beds are clearing out and the debris moves into the empty hoop.  Next weekend, the coop will perch on a bed once more and the chickens will be confined to a smaller space. They don’t seem to mind; the world will soon enough be rainy and dim.

                I will miss summer. The warm sunny days feel more precious each year, as we try to find time in the wilderness between mosquitoes hatching and wildfire haze. In the face of this constantly changing world, the rituals of fall, moving towards winter, are also precious.

The Equinox

 

We are moving into the Equinox, balancing light and dark, work and rest, inward and outward movements. This is what we are seeing now:

Morning fires in the garden.

The vines making a last long dash across the trellis.

Cedar Waxwings on the top third of the fig tree.

Smoky, dusty haze across the valley.

Cat sprawled on the bricks in the greenhouse, warming her old bones.

Twilight comes earlier every day—the bunny is not happy to go into the hutch sooner.

A basket of delicate squash.

Harvest moonlight and moon watch.

More people and more cars in car—schools are opening.

The drier runs all evening with figs and plums.

Crockpots of tomato sauce.

Soak in the warmth of the slanting sunlight now, knowing the clouds are coming soon.

 

 

 

Climate Debates

 

                On Thursday afternoon, the city council engaged in a robust discussion on whether or not to include the phrase “climate resilient” into a statement about Corvallis being a safe city. (It’s not in there yet.) You can watch the debate online: we began around 5:15, when I had a problem with the fact that, in all of our statements of priorities for the city, climate change was not mentioned.  Arguments went from: seven people are running on climate concerns for council this year and it is the key issue for most people under fifty to it’s not the city’s job to address climate change mitigation or adaptation at the community level. Such work is best left to the federal government (because that has worked so well for the last 40 years).  When we engage in these discussions, I hold my students close and try to convey the level of concern, anxiety, and panic our lack of action on climate change creates every day. I promised them to do my utmost to mitigate this loaming disaster, to leave them with not quite as large a mess to clean up when I am gone. Sometimes, that thread of the argument works.

                After the meeting, I went home to pack for a camping trip. Mark and I drove over the mountains to the Metolius River and Camp Sherman, where we had managed to reserve the best campsite on the river for the weekend. We have been visiting this magical place in the early fall for 20 odd years now. We have seen how some restoration work has taken hold and how other places need a little more love. We have watched cabins fall into disrepair and then be brought back to life with a new generation. We have been there in pouring rain, bright autumn sunshine and, this year, a smoky haze. As we stood o the bridge last night, watching a dipper dance on a branch in the cold, cold river, I wondered: why would you not do everything you can to preserve this beautiful, intricate, and damaged planet? It is our home. Why destroy our home?

               

                 

 

The Datsun

                 There’s been a small white hatchback cruising my neighborhood for several days. I caught a glimpse of it one day as it went down the street and, yesterday, it was parked, so I sidled up to it for a closer inspection. White. Hatchback. Datsun B210 GX.  In good shape.  No way…I thought. Still on the road. Only in Oregon.

                The only new car my mother ever owned was this exact Datsun model. She bought it when she was in the process of divorcing my father, which took several years. Before that, we were one truck family—a gold GMC work truck. If and when my mother was working, she had to be dropped off and picked up. When we went shopping, it was with my four cousins and my aunt, all in the station wagon. Until I was in high school, except for one summer with an old VW Bug that died quickly, she did not have her own transportation.  We lived a distance away from stores and family. It had to rankle, especially as she became the sole breadwinner for the family as the owner of her own small business and walked to work (a block but still…)  

                She bought this car because it was sporty and cutting edge, I am sure. When she was 18, she had a red and white convertible (used) and bought a matching dress and scarf to go with it. She was not a station wagon minded mom; she had an image to uphold. But it was also practical. At a time when gas prices were high and going higher, it got excellent gas mileage—much better than the truck. Japanese cars were on the rise for quality while American cars were on a downslide. Even in the snow and ice, that car drove.  The hatch allowed us to haul furniture to Durham when I went away to college a few years later. There was space. And it was hers.

                She kept that car for years. It had 200,000 miles on it, at least, all local driving. Over the years, the muffler was replaced regularly and she did regular maintenance, but no expensive engine repairs. There was a large, beige bondo spot on the driver’s side after an attempted home repair when the salt began to eat away at the frame. But it passed inspection every six months. It was paid for. And it was hers.

                I’ve been thinking about that car and my mother’s independence this week, during the Democratic convention, as the nominee talks about her own mother’s lessons and struggles bringing up two girls in a time when women’s roles were in flux and our mothers were coming into their own power, emotionally and economically.  I suspect there is a similar car in the Harris family story—one that kept on running, because it was hers.